


Timeless

by CatherineEmbrace



Category: Original Work
Genre: Original Story - Freeform, Tumblr Prompt, Vampires, WW2 story, cause why the hell not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-23
Updated: 2016-12-23
Packaged: 2018-09-11 09:30:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8974264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CatherineEmbrace/pseuds/CatherineEmbrace
Summary: At the beginning of WW2, a female vampire decides to disguise herself as a man in order to fight her country's war. Apprehensive about the whole ordeal, she tries to find what she truly stands for after two and a half centuries of running from her own past, while attempting to create a better world for the future.But can anything be solved by violence?





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone,  
> So, I saw a prompt for WW2 vampires when I was trawling through pinterest, and decided that this might be an interesting thing to write. I have no idea if I will keep writing this, and I apologize for any historical inaccuracies. If you spot anything out of place, I would love to hear any and all feedback. My first chapters are usually fairly haphazard, so I'm sorry if the tone or perspective shifts abruptly.  
> Thank you all for reading my story!  
> ~Catherine

It was hard, being immortal. 

The woman laughed to herself as she began to wipe down the benchtop of the bar that she worked at. That was probably the understatement of the century, if she was honest. At the ripe old age of two-hundred and thirty-six, the woman was still just a child, compared to some of the truly ancient vampires that she had met. But, considering that she was nearly three times older than most mortal humans, she figured that she could complain. 

To be honest, immortality didn’t really bother her. She had always seen herself as a rather forward thinking individual, and while getting used to all the new advancements in technologies and attitudes and just… life in general was a bit difficult, she truly didn’t mind. Of course, the world was a hard place, especially for a woman like herself. But, life had always been like that, so she was used to it. But it was getting better, which was always uplifting. Even though her heart didn’t beat, she could still feel.

And, living in Australia was always a bonus. When comparing her most current home to the rest of the world, the woman felt that the newly founded nation was going to be a lot more… fair, even if some of their policies were a bit questionable. She didn’t care much for politics. The woman had migrated to the new country in… 1856, if she remembered correctly, coming on the SS Great Britain. She still had the original ticket with her, acting as something of a memento. Having lived through the Federation of the country, the woman had resided in Melbourne for a good twelve years. That had been when the Great War had started, and as a newly founded country, the Australians were extremely eager to prove themselves to the rest of the world.

The woman had kept out of it. She had lived through enough war in the past, and would much rather try to forget the world in this far-flung, remote country. And, for a while, it was enough. 

But, of course, she could never truly stay. As an immortal, she was forever stuck in the age that she had been turned. For her, that had been on the eve of her 21st birthday. She didn’t like to remember that date; it had been an excruciating affair, and only after she’d crawled out of the alleyway that she had been attacked in, she’d realised that she’d been turned. 

The woman shook her head. No. She didn’t want to remember. 

But they had won the Great War, and had forced Germany to take blame for everything that had happened, which the woman found to be a bit excessive. All the extreme taxes placed on the country and the huge amount of bans… the woman sighed. Nothing good would come of it. 

She lived in Perth now, the isolated capital of the west. It was a tiny town, with a population of only 300 000 people, if the woman remembered correctly. They were pretty small. But that was good. She’d moved to the west during the Great Depression, in order to escape from the rumours and suspicions of the others in the city. At least, here, she could hide. 

It wasn’t the worst place in the world. The weather was fairly decent, and the people were quite nice. Of course, it was a major pain when she had to feed, but she had become quite good at supressing her appetite, meaning that she only had to feed once every few weeks. As a result, she was also very good at hiding bodies, which she always despised. She had accepted her existence a long, long time ago, but it didn’t mean that she liked killing. As a result, and to avoid drawing suspicion to herself, she only preyed upon the lower levels of society. The people that no one would miss. 

She also wasn’t the only vampire living in the small city; there were about two or three others living near the woman. It was nice to have like-minded company over, once in a while, but having more than three or four vampire in such a small town tended to draw attention. Too many dead bodies. 

The woman shook her head, returning her attention to the bench in front of her. She was only thinking about dead bodies since it was almost time for her to feed again. But, she’d worry about that in the coming week. She had a bar to help close down at the moment. 

While it wasn’t the most glamorous job in the world, it was still work. And besides, she would rather work in a drunk-filled bar than resort to crime. She’d had enough crime for a lifetime. At least her boss was pretty nice, and if she winked, and talked up the patrons enough, she would sometimes walk away with a very nice tip, which was always pleasing. Sometimes, she’d draw a bit too much attention, and would have to grab some help from the other bartender in order to fend off the touchy-feely customers, but she could fend for herself, if pushed. 

It was about closing time, nearing midnight, with only a few regulars still left in the bar. The place, known as the Jolly Swagman, of all things, was pretty close to the city, which meant for a regular flow of customers and patrons. She nodded to the other bartender – a brown-haired, fair skinned man known as James – who gave her a short nod back. Tucking his washcloth back into the elastic of his workpants, the man wandered over to the last of the customers, beginning to rouse them out of their drunken stupors. It didn’t take very long, and within ten minutes, the last of the men were stumbling out the door.

Once they had left, the woman removed herself from behind the counter, heading over to clean up the leftover glasses and spilled drinks. She didn’t usually like to step out from behind the counter, as some men, when drunk, had a habit of treating her like a hooker, which she absolutely resented. As a result, she had accidently started a few brawls, resulting in the injuries of most of the men involved. So, she was usually confined to behind the counter, which, if she was honest, didn’t bother her. 

“Are you walking home again, Catherine?” James called from across the dimly lit room. The woman smiled at the man, nodding once before turning to pick up the tray of glasses that she had precariously stacked. Most people would be rather nervous at the wobbling stack of glass, but she’d always had rather good balance, and only tended to drop things when pushed or startled. 

“Yeah. Don’t worry, I’ll get home alright.”

A chuckle came from the brunette. “I have no doubt about that, but be careful, okay?”

“Yes, mum, I will.” 

The man laughed, before the atmosphere of the room sobered a bit. James sighed. “Did you hear what happened today?”

More news on the brewing conflict in Europe, Catherine supposed. The woman sighed, looking over at her friend. “Nothing good, I suppose?”

“Germany invaded Poland,” The man paused, “I think Great Britain is going to declare war.”

“Which means that we’ll be dragged into it.” The woman sighed, placing the dirty glasses down on the benchtop. That was not good news. James sighed, shaking his head. Catherine had known the man for nearly three years now – ever since she had begun working here – and knew that he detested war. His father had fought in the Great War and had come back a broken man. He didn’t like to talk about it, since his father had taken his own life a few years after he had returned. James had only been eleven. It had been a trying time for everyone, from what Catherine had heard. 

While the other bartender was opposed to getting into another war, the woman had mainly just resigned herself to the fact that people were always going to fight. It’d happened with the Great War, it had happened with the Boer Wars and every war before that. 

It seemed that the woman shared this resignation with a number of older Australian citizens, most of which had either worked for the war effort or who had fought in the war itself. From most of the chatter the woman had picked up on in the bar, most of the young men were excited at the prospect of a new war breaking out. They wanted to fight, and Catherine couldn’t understand why.

Maybe she was just tired of the world always being in conflict. 

It took nearly an hour to finish cleaning up the bar, to which her brunette friend bade her a safe travel home. She had laughed and smiled, wishing her friend the same in turn.

 

The woman wasn’t sure what the world would bring, but when Great Britain declared war on Germany, and Australia did in turn, the woman knew that this would be the event to change to world. Maybe that was what prompted her to sign up for war, nearly six months after the first declaration reached the Australian continent. Maybe she wanted to help the country that had sheltered her for nearly a century, and had grown rather attached to the freedoms that it had given her. At least, she was tired of sitting around. And, something was bugging her, something that had been keeping her up for many sleepless nights, was that this was going to be worse than the Great War. So maybe it was fear that caused her to disguise herself as a man, managing to sweet talk and charm her way into the army, using nearly two and a half centuries of experience to disguise herself. 

 

And besides, it wasn’t like she could be easily killed. As an immortal, most of the stereotypes that were usually held against her kind were usually quite false. She could walk in the sun, crosses didn’t bother her, and garlic didn’t faze her. Silver didn’t bother her either, and she didn’t sleep in a coffin. The only difference between her and a normal mortal was her heightened sense of smell, hearing and sight, increased stamina and strength and rather pale skin, which usually led her to becoming horribly burnt and pink if she remained in the sun for too long. She also healed at a stupidly fast rate, which almost neglected the damage caused by normal weapons, such as knives. And, of course, her slightly elongated canines, but she was quite adept at hiding them, if she cared to admit. 

James hadn’t taken the news well. He had been rather upset, actually, and would refuse to look at the woman for the rest of the night. She had tried to tell him when she had first found out - nearly a whole month ago - but he hadn't listened. While Catherine didn’t usually care much for dates or times, she had made sure to remain glued to the radio. It was a special night, tonight, although probably not for the right reasons. 

Tonight, she was shipping out. While most men were being shipped out to exotic places across the world, the woman was leaving for Singapore. While there were no major conflicts in that area – there weren’t many major conflicts anywhere, really, since the war had only been going on for six months or so, and it was only 1939 - she had to be in Fremantle by ten, and had swung by the old bar to say goodbye to James. He was still quite upset at the fact that she had decided to enlist. 

Catherine sighed, pulling her hat off of her head to run her fingers through her hair. She had cut it a while ago, in order to enlist, and her now messy red locks flopped almost lazily across her forehead. While the woman had already received a few cracks about being ‘feminine,’ apparently no-one suspected the fair-skinned soldier of actually being a woman. While her jawline was slimmer than most of the men in her squadron, centuries of travel had taken away most of the softness associated with women of that time period. Or, at least, she could glare and try to appear intimidating. She’d figure out how to keep hidden in the army as she went along. It wasn’t the first time she’d disguised herself as a man, so she supposed she had some experience in that area. 

At the turn of the hour, the redhead sighed. She had to leave now, in order to give her enough time to reach the harbour. Standing up, she smiled at her friend, who was now just staring at her sadly. Placing her hat back on her head, firmly, the soldier tipped her hat towards her brunette friend before exiting the bar. It was probably the last time she would see this place for a long time. There was no telling how long the war would last. 

Catherine just hoped that James would find her letter, tucked underneath her upturned glass, and that he would understand why she wanted to fight, given her usual apprehension for war. Something felt different this time. 

The woman just shrugged, opening the door, before she disappeared out into the night.


End file.
